Tag Archives: Millennial Cults

Ideologies of Undivided Devotion

Posted on February 10, 2018 by Andrew Stuttaford

From Yuri Slezkine’s magnificent The House  of Government’, a Saga of the Russian Revolution, a book centered around the idea that Bolshevism was, at its heart, just another millenarian sect, if a peculiarly malevolent one: “Of the seventeen prisoners, thirteen, amongst … Continue reading →

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Bolsheviks, Millenarians and the Reformation

Posted on November 12, 2017 by Andrew Stuttaford

Writing in the Hedgehog, from, it seems (but perhaps that’s just me), a hard left perspective, Eugene McCarraher takes a look at the millenarian aspects of Bolshevism, and, more specifically its connection with the Reformation: Shortly after the Bolshevik victory, … Continue reading →

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Bolsheviks and other Millenarians

Posted on November 11, 2017 by Andrew Stuttaford

If I had to choose one book to read about the Bolsheviks this year it would be The House of Government: A Saga of the Russian Revolution by Yuri Slezkine. Writing in the New York Review of Books Benjamin Nathans … Continue reading →

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1789 and All That

Posted on October 17, 2017 by Andrew Stuttaford

It’s not hard to draw a line between messianic Judaism and (obviously) Christianity and from that on to later millenarian variants such as Marxism, but this review in the New Statesman by the British philosopher John Gray of Forgetfulness: Making … Continue reading →

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ISIS: Looking to the North

Posted on February 19, 2015 by Andrew Stuttaford

Cross-posted on the Corner: Over in the Financial Times, there’s an interesting piece on Putin’s friends abroad, but this passage in particular caught my eye: The current Egyptian government believes that the Obama administration’s failure to support former President Hosni … Continue reading →

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“Pre-Traumatic Stress Disorder”

Posted on November 1, 2014 by Andrew Stuttaford

Cross-posted on the Corner Just when you think that the misery that climate change is bringing in its wake can get no worse, there is this. Grist reports: …From depression to substance abuse to suicide and post-traumatic stress disorder, growing … Continue reading →

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Marx and the Millennium

Posted on August 31, 2014 by Andrew Stuttaford

Over at Mises, they have posted a long (very long) examination by the late (and, in my view, often profoundly misguided) Murray Rothbard demonstrating how Marxism fits into a much older millennialist tradition. The piece is something of a struggle … Continue reading →

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Marx as Prophet

Posted on August 30, 2014 by Andrew Stuttaford

From Alexander Gray’s The Socialist Tradition (1946): “Marx, it has been said, was a prophet … and perhaps this suggestion provides the best approach. One does not apply to Jeremiah or Ezekiel the tests to which less-inspired men are subjected. … Continue reading →

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The Church of Climate Change?

Posted on November 27, 2009 by Andrew Stuttaford

Heather, in the course of your (fine) post on Syncopation and Thanksgiving, you reject the notion “that global warming theory represents some atavistic religious impulse.” In one sense, of course, you are quite right to do so. The idea that we … Continue reading →

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The Bells, The Bells

Posted on November 14, 2009 by Andrew Stuttaford

Given the extraordinary record of success that Christianity’s various sects have shown in predicting the arrival of the apocalypse, this story made me laugh: GENEVA — The World Council of Churches on Thursday called on churches around the world to … Continue reading →

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